Making Alcohol Jelly (from Calcium Acetate) 

There's actually a trick to holding the burning ball. If you hold it in your open palm, less air gets in below it and the underside burns cooler, allowing you to hold it for longer (I'm talking half a second to a whole second here). You also want to handle it *slowly*, to prevent fanning air onto the ball. You can also throw it back and forth between hands slowly in a sort of juggling motion, allowing you to hold it indefinitely. I'd also encourage you to do this without water on your hands, as it's actually safer. The next trick is with a friend try throwing them to each other, over a distance of 5 - 10 metres, the noise they make while airbourne is something to behold. Again, just like holding them, nice gentle arcs through the air, limit the speed of any movements you make, and do it in an area where you can drop it if if gets too hot. Also, tie back any long hair, and make sure you pull up the sleeves of any shirt or jumper you're wearing. The smell of burnt arm hair and bacon will go away in a day or two.

I bet this would be handy in a toothpaste tube, along with one of those spark-making rods. This stuff seems like it would be much easier to use for starting campfires than many of the other handy firestarters. If you run out of the paste, you still have the spark stick, but both should remain functional if the tube and stick got wet.

Children : snowball fights! Nile : FLAMING SNOWBALL FIGHT MOFOS, get on my level

I really love that even going back 4 years your content is still totally enjoyable and educational. My 4 year old loves your videos and as soon as I'm not poor im going to make him his own lab

when cutting up the ball of the jelly, you refer to the alcohol as ethanol even though you used isopropanol

Do you think you could do a tour of your lab?

"hey bro are you gonna join us in the snowball fight?" "sure bro lemme just get my calcium acetate"

"Alcohol jelly: sounds like something crazy kids from MIT would come up with.

I like this video very much. It reminds me when I first discovered this after I added Isopropanol to dissolved eggshells in vinnegar.

Sorta fun fact: Some old flamethrowers had this stuff inside as fuel

Some people roast marshmallows in the flame of this gel in other youtube demonstrations. I wouldn't recommend eating the marshmallows because they end up absorbing the acetone that comes off of the burned byproduct or even acetylene depending on what form of alcohol they use. It's good for filling empty fondant fuel containers. Even though it's considered food grade the byproduct it produces isn't.

I like how the fire forms kind of standing wave pattern.

The stored flammable jelly can be used as a flexible ice pack if stored in a freezer. It should also reduce the evaporation of the ethanol even though the ziploc bag.

Hell yes it works! It seems like all that work paid off. I failed to pyrolyse my calcium carbonate so it got half burned which made it brown, but I turned it to calcium acetate anyway, it was very hard when I dried it so I was really unsure it would work, but it turnes out it did. Edit: Huh is doesn't last when I stored it away, it just turned into more of a liquid. Must be the impurities.

You Sir, brought me back into chemistry. 😊✌

Very well done.

I did this experiment with my children, we started from the calium acetate we also made from eggshells. The kids loved to play with fire! The recipe is perhaps 5 times too big to be safe for children ... Thanks for an effort to make all those nice video!

These are great fire starters for camping!

Nice stuff man :D going to try it out if I get some anhydrouse alcohol^^

fun party trick, get some 70% easily acquired from the store, start by adding ice to very cold water and then take a spray bottle with alcohol and spray it through a candle flame at your hand, it should burn up as it gets close but it burns so fast and theirs so little that you only feel a pleasant warmth, also good for removing hair XD.

Plz do acetone from dry disstilation next

4:10 that fire was lit af.

I'm researching how to make parrafin wax and it's made using oil and a solvent like acetone. Acetone is made by dry distilling calcium acetate. Calcium Acetate in turn is made by soaking calcium carbonate in acid, like egg shells in vinegar. So my idea is to soak some small animal bones in vinegar to form calcium acetate. Then i let it dry out. The calcium acetate will then be mixed with oil under some light heat, or in my case pine pitch. We will see what happends. Hopefully it forms sort of a solid, hence wax. I will also try just simply mix pine pitch with charcoal and ground chalk. This may or may not give a slower burn. Then I can make a bushcraft candle haha lol.

Hi, man I was looking for way, how to solify alcohol for the purposes of the computer game I am going to developed durring the summer, so I would like to thank you for this video :)

Hi, I wondered if you could do a video on the process of methylating transition metals? just curious as to how methyl organometallic compounds are synthesised, thank you :)

AWESOME!!!!

Just wondering if this is similar to hand sanitiser. Been wondering how that stuff doesnt just evaporate etc.

It perfect for quick campfire starter

The overall shape, of the ball on fire, reminded me of old school Street Fighter Hadoukens. Now I'm in nostalgia mode.

cannot wait for the red phosphorus vid!

Any chance you could do a video on deep eutectic solvents?

remember us when you're famous

You should show the salting out of isopropal alcohol to get rid of the water.

What do you think about making a cinnamic acid by using benzaldehyde and acetic anhydride? Of course with steam distillation process;)

Colloids are fun to play with. XD

Do you think we could get a video on the synthesis of cyclohexylamine?

Very nice 👍

I had the impression that the jelly isn't easy to moldel and won't stick together to allow more or less arbitrary shapes. Do you think it is possible to control the jellification process in a way so that you can mold nice looking items?

NileRed do you know why it would liquify after storing in airtight container? Bummed bc a made a bunch successfully using non-denatured ethyl alcohol and it's now back to being liquid (pretty much).

This was cool. A few times you said “isopropanol” which appears to be unintended.

Looks like i'm not the only one who's wondering if you can make chewable shooters with this method.

Is water needed or could I pour powdered calcium acetate into a 70% isopropyl alcohol

do you need to use high concentration ethanol? or could you also use 10% to 30% ??

Just a thought. Can the jel be wax coated? For a simple fire starter.

Mine is not working at all. I used a white wine vinegar, maybe that had to do with it? I also did not clean the powder afterwards, maybe that was the problem? Maybe I overheated while crystalizing. I'm not sure what I did wrong. I also soaked the eggshells with the vinegar in a stainless steel pot. Any tips here? Thanks

Nice. Made some with ethanol but it "melted" to running jelly after a day???? How to store this correctly and maybe recreate solid form?

How do they make the fire jelly that pops and snaps?

I'd really like to see you attempting the synthesis of Trimethylaluminum There are some interesting papers online about the procedures too.

This stuff is in gelling-for-flame purity really easy to synthesize. Just get 25% acetic acid from your supermarket, react it with as much calcium hydroxide (in the cement section of your local building supply store, you might wanna check the web for "brand" names. (Here in germany its "Calciumhydroxid" vs. "Löschkalk", which is called slaked lime. If you cant get that, try to substitute for calciumoxide. Beware that this does more damage to skin, so be more carefull. The dry/non-slurry hydroxide is not more dangerous than the acid itself, and that is not too dangerous. It is defatting thoug by creating soap.) The mixing ratio should be aroung 1 volume part calcium(hydr)oxide for 10 volume parts 25% acetic acid. Maybe even 1:30 or so. just try a small scale to get a feeling. You have to barely dissolve all lime, but you don't want more acetic acid than necessary. Anything above 10% over the required amount could lead to slower gelling. The resulting mixture (mine was a little brown stained, like tea, but that doesnt really show in the gel) can be directly used from between 1:20 to 1:5 calciumacetate-solution to (for my case) ethanol. The key is to mix it before it gells, as that prevents further mixing. I had good results pouring the ethanol into the burning container and injecting a stream of solution with a syringe. Also usefull to get the right dose. Just align and shoot as fast as you can. Try not to touch the syringe into the alcohol, and ofc you do not need the hypodermic needle. Just as simple plastic syringe suffices. If you do touch the alcohol, the syringe might require cleaning. Use cold-ish water (hot might be dangerous for your hands and the plasic of the syringe. Really cheap. Like 5 bucks for gelling a 10l bucket of ethanol. Also the only heat required is to ignite. It does however speed the reaction up.

Flammable snowballs

Back in high school, we used to take two pieces of paper and crumple them into one ball, doused in lighter fluid, and coat them in candle wax. Light it and play hacky sack. Just a warning, you probably want to do it without shoes or a shirt, nothing baggy or anything you care about.

Does this work with other acetates? I'm thinking about creating nice coloured flames with transition metals

Could this work with Methyl Hydrate? I use that as fuel for a "do it your self" pop can stove. It works great to heat up water and make coffee. But it be nice if it was in a gel form.

So for making acetone, if I use calcium benzoate, can I make benzophenone? There was a video from chemplayer but I can't seem to find it anymore and they made acetophenone

aha! one time I mixed ethanol with a store brand frozen grape juice, and it resulted in a very sterno-like smell. Calcium Acetate is used as a ph regulator. Coincidence?

I 1st thought for real that Nile blue was your alter ego twin.

Have you tried making jellied alcohol with methylcellulose?

awesome :D

Make acetone from calcium acetate dry distillation! I've been looking forward to this one forever!

Hey, Nile; what font do you use in your video thumbnails? It looks familiar and I'd like to use it. Thanks!

Collect washed egg shells to make your calcium acetate

Nice vid, wish i could do this stuff at home..

The closest i can get to this is jello shots

Where can one purchase the calcium acetate? Thank you!

Is this safe to put in a tube and squirt it onto wood to use as fire starter?

Hey Nile. Please please please make that video on Lithium Peroxide. I'm really looking forward to it!Best wishes,Hampton.

Wait did NileRed just teach me how to make Napalm?

Does this light with a spark of a ferro rod also?

alcohol jelly aka mario fireball lol

Good sir

Hello Can the calcium Acetate be reused after the alcohol burned off ? Is it possible to use something like a press to make fuel tablets from it, or would be to much alcohol pressed out and the burntime would be reduced to much? 🤔

Hii brother is there anyway to prepare fuel gel by using sodium acetate ?

we are going to make an expiremental research in which instead of eggshells, we will use golden apple snail shells. Is it a good alternative as source of calcium carbonate?

Could you use Acetone? (I want to use the acetone that I made following one of his other videos)

this would be good for firing carbon mixed with it.

#NileRed Please tell me how to turn my rum into jelly. The thing is that I want to make edible jelly from 80% dark rum and need to add a little bit sugar. Someone adviced me to use agar-agar but it didn't work for me.

could you use isopropyl nitrate?

It is not alcohol jelly, but, calcium acetate jelly with alcohol (metanol or ethanol). After alcohol burned, the fire is acetone burning.

I detect some guilt for making those piranha solution videos 😅 It's a useful acid though

You're genial 👌🏽

Which other alcohol can be used in place of isopropyl alcohol

Does this leave a bad smell or toxic fumes?

Cool

Are you using white vinegar or cleaning vinegar?

Since calcium acetate is used as a food additive, would it be safe to assume you could make some sort of edible alcohol jelly with ethanol?

What is the app I'm supposed to download that will help the channel?

Is calcium acetate gel lyophobic or lyophilic? Thanks

Fun fact: Moonshiners spread this on their toast.

Saw flammable jelly trap?

Can use ethylene glycol or glycerol?

you should make the mercaptan (Thiol) they add to gasoline for the smell. it's like pure rotten egg smell.

I want to make some of this for my doomsday bag, If it starts to dry out, can you regenerate it by adding more alcohol to the bag and mixing it?

Does it remind anybody else of that squishy baff stuff?

This stuff was once made and sold in large quantities as "Chafing dish solid fuel" in India

Could you do that with calcium formiate?

Brother, tell me how do I make powder of this jelly? ASAP

is this the same thing as trioxane tablets?

Is it possible to use methylated spirit ( i dont know the actual word but it i mean the liquide that you use in small burners) instead of isopropyl alcohol?

So this would not be considered a precipitate?

5:31 eveyrone